(a) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a vertically aligned mode liquid crystal display, and, in particular, to a vertically aligned mode liquid crystal display including an electrode with cutouts for securing wide viewing angle.
(b) Description of Related Art
A typical liquid crystal display (“LCD”) includes an upper panel with a reference electrode and color filters, a lower panel with thin film transistors (“TFTs”) and pixel electrodes and a liquid crystal layer with dielectric anisotropy interposed therebetween, and displays desired images by applying different voltages to the reference electrode and the pixel electrodes to generate electric field in the liquid crystal layer, which changes the orientations of liquid crystal molecules to control the light transmittance.
Among these LCDs, a vertically aligned mode LCD (referred to as a “VALCD” hereinafter), which aligns the major axes of the liquid crystal molecules vertical to upper and lower panels in absence of electric field, is promising because of its high contrast ratio and wide viewing angle.
To implement wide viewing angle in the VALCD, a cutout pattern or protuberances are provided on the electrode. Both generate fringe field to regularly distribute tilt directions of the liquid crystal molecules into four directions, thereby giving wide viewing angle.
Meanwhile, a plurality of signal wires such as gate lines transmitting scanning signals and data lines transmitting image signals are provided on a panel with the TFTs (referred to as a “TFT array panel” hereinafter) for an LCD. These signal wires have their own resistances and are coupled with peripheral signal wires or the reference electrode of the upper panel to generate coupling capacitances. The loads due to such a resistances and capacitances of respective wires generate the distortion of the signals transmitted via the signal wires such as RC delay. In particular, the capacitive coupling between the data lines and the reference electrode drives the liquid crystal molecules disposed therebetween to cause light leakage near the data line, thereby deteriorating the image quality, and the light leakage, in turn, forces to enlarge the black matrix to reduce the aperture ratio.